


A Quiet SOS at Night

by runningthroughlightning



Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: Addiction, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Past Abuse, Season 1 Spoilers, Season 2 spoilers, Season 3 Spoilers, Season 4 Spoilers, Season 5 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-20
Updated: 2019-07-20
Packaged: 2020-07-09 10:30:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 17,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19886131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runningthroughlightning/pseuds/runningthroughlightning
Summary: "Things in Abel were turning to shit. Half the population was gone. The world was filled with mind control and zombies. But he trusted Five to get to the bottom of it. Five was the best, the smartest runner he knew. He depended on her more than he realized.But then Moonchild came.When Moonchild took her, he felt the floor drop out from under him.After Moonchild, Five never really came back."...There's a benefit to being the radio operator at Abel township.  It means you help keep the town safe, guide the runners to safety, keep an eye on everyone you care about.  There are also drawbacks.  Sure, you get to watch as it all comes together.  You also get to watch as it all falls apart....This is Five's story, from Sam's perspective. From Season 1 to Season 5. In which "Sam loves all his runner equally" can kiss my ass.





	1. Chapter 1

When the new Five came in, Sam almost tripped out his chair to go meet them. Sure, Abel got new members all the time, but it wasn’t every day that one came in on a blazing chopper of glory. Plus, Sam had led this new person to Abel. He kind of felt responsible to greet them when they arrived. (He felt responsible for all his runners. He had only been at this ‘radio operator’ game for a few weeks but it was clear just what kind of importance his position had for the runners.)

  
The gates had just shut when he arrived to meet the runner. A sizeable crowd had formed, surely drawn out by the sound of the chopper exploding. Sam shoved his way to the middle, waving his arms. “Alright, alright! Give some room please!” His runners never liked to be crowded after a run. Probably this person wouldn’t either. So he shoved them away, and turned with what he hoped was a welcoming smile. “Hey! Good to see you in the flesh… the totally-unbroken, skin-not-bitten-by-zombies flesh, right? Step back, step back everyone, don’t crowd! Give Runner Five some space! Can’t take in so many new faces right now.” There was more murmuring, but general dissent, as the crowd slowly dispersed. He reached out a hand to help new Runner Five up.

  
The girl in front of him looked young. Shell-shocked, for sure, with big brown eyes staring owlishly at her surroundings, panting for breath. She was wearing a torn military outfit, but it absolutely swallowed her. So, definitely not a soldier, then. Probably just a lucky survivor picked up by Mullins and given whatever the base could offer. She certainly didn’t give off that hard, military vibe. Sam was glad; maybe she’d be a good ally against hard-ass Janine.

  
Also, she was smoking. After helping her up, he noticed there were still embers in her hair from the helicopter explosion, making her look a little deranged. “Oh, uh- you got a little—” He reached out, and she lurched backward.

  
“Sorry! Sorry. Didn’t mean to spook you. You’re just –you’re still a little toasty,” he said, gesturing to his own head. She balked, then patted her own hair down. It made her look a little less Einstein-ian.

  
Sam smiled again, trying to be as reassuring as possible. “Hey, there you go!” He reached out a hand, this time for a simple shake. “I’m Sam Yao. The, uh—the radio guy? The voice you heard? Well, uh—that’s me!” She hesitated, looked down at his hand, and then at up at his face. Did he—did he still have marmite on his face, or something? He was usually never the intimidating one.

  
Eventually though, she shook his hand, and the breath was let out between them.

  
“Super glad you’re okay. Rough introduction to Abel. I swear it’s much more chill on the inside.” He felt like he was talking too much. That was a common occurrence. “Also, sorry I just stuck you with the name Runner Five. It just works well in the field. We go by real names in here. Or at least, whatever you want. Some guy is named Emby and I’m almost for sure that isn’t his real—”

  
Just then, Maxine appeared beside them with Janine in tow. “Hey there! Thanks so much for picking up the med kits—and that file! Are you alright? No bumps, breaks, or bites?”  
Five looked between the two women, still a little out a breath, and shook her head.

  
Janine stepped forward. “I’m glad to hear it. My name is Janine De Luca—”

  
“The owner of Abel,” Sam said, and Janine rolled her eyes.

  
“The owner of this property of land upon which Abel was built, Mr. Yao.” She turned back toward Five. “Mullins told us they’d be sending supplies, but they didn’t say with whom. May I ask your name?”

  
There was a pause, and then suddenly Five was scrambling through her pockets. They waited.

  
Clearly, she did not find what she was looking for, because she looked back at Janine awkwardly. She hesitated, then gestured ambiguously to her mouth.

  
Sam looked at Maxine. Maxine shrugged.

  
“Sorry?” Janine frowned.

  
Five did the gesture again, this time while mouthing a few words. A sort of half-noise came out, but nothing more. Like a buffoon, it took Sam until that point to realize she hadn’t spoken a single word this entire time.

Luckily, Janine also looked a little taken aback. “Oh! I’m sorry! Are you mute?”

  
For some reason, Five’s eyes flicked to Sam and Maxine, and then back toward Janine. She nodded.

  
“Oh, not a problem. I speak BSL,” Janine said, whilst signing a few words.

  
They all turned back to Five expectantly. She seemed to wince, and then shake her head.

  
Janine, now, was clearly uncomfortable. “Oh, you don’t…? Were you recently muted?”

  
There was a fervent nod, and Janine simply rolled with the punches. “No problem. I’m sure we will think of something. I’d just like to welcome you to Abel and do some introductions. It’s a shame your supplies did not make it, but we don’t turn people away in Abel for no reason. If you can work, you can stay.”

  
“She can be a runner!” Sam piped in, and almost immediately received a dirty look.

  
“Sam, just because she arrived here running doesn’t automatically make her a runner.”

  
He felt the urge to stick out his tongue.

  
Janine continued on. “This is Dr. Myers. She’ll take you to the Med station, check you for any bites, and situate you for the night. If you’d like to return to Mullins that’s of course also an option…” Already, they were walking away, and Sam felt a little betrayed.

“Hey, wait! There’s an open bunk in the Runner’s barracks! She could take Five’s—”

  
But Janine was already on a roll, listing available positions. Farming, tech, and sewage were among them.

  
Stupid, Sam realized, why did he automatically assume she’d be a Runner?

  
But at the last second the girl turned, made eye contact with him, and smiled. He wasn’t very good at reading lips, but it certainly looked like a Thank you.

  
He smiled. Not everyone had to be runners, he supposed. But it was sure nice to be needed.

* * *

“She chose to be a runner, you know,” Maxine said the next time he saw her. “After we got a pen and paper she made that very clear.”

  
“Hey, no way!” he said, trying very hard not to feel like saying ‘told you so’ to Janine. “Did we ever get her name?”

  
“She wouldn’t say. She wants to go by Five though.” She raised an eyebrow at him, teasingly. “Makes me wonder what you said to get her to agree. You bribe her or something, Sam? Offering Curly Wurlies under the table?”

  
Sam just laughed, suddenly feeling a little self-conscious. “What can I say? I guess I’m just a charmer.”

  
Maxine shook her head but smiled. “Well, you certainly charmed her.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please bear with me with all the weird formatting I can't figure out how to edit on ao3 for shit.

He didn’t see Five much in the following days, besides the few runs. Mostly she’d do a little knock on his desk to announce herself, grab her headset with a little smile, and be off. Abel was small but he somehow skirted around her until a few weeks later, grabbing lunch in the mess hall. She was sitting by herself, head down, apparently fascinated by her meal. There were a good twenty other people in the mess hall, chatting loudly. He spied Runner Six, who was trying to wave him over. But there Five was, looking like an lonely island in the ocean.  
The chopper--he realized--people didn’t trust her because of the helicopter crash. So, she had the whole end of the table to herself, with everyone else squished to the other side.  
That seemed a little ridiculous. Sure, he understood the suspicion but come on, this was starting to look like a primary school drama. No one should have to sit by themselves in the zombie apocalypse.  
So, with ugly porridge in hand, he approached her. She was focused strongly on her meal, and almost jumped when he cleared his throat. She looked up.  
“Uh… hey! Mind if I sit here?”  
She looked genuinely surprised. Her eyes darted to Maggie and Rajit, a few seats down. She shook her head.  
“Hey, fantastic job on that run yesterday. You were doing, like, parkour through the trees. It was cool.”  
“Oh, thanks.”  
Sam blinked. It was quiet, so for a second he thought he made it up, but he was pretty sure Five just spoke.  
“Oh! You can—Wow, I may have a horrible misunderstanding of what ‘mute’ means, because I was almost positive—”  
“Sorry, um—I’m not fully mute. Just on runs,” she said, looking a little embarrassed. Her voice was very soft, and in the crowded mess hall, he had to strain to hear.  
“How does that…?”  
“I’m—I’ve just got a messed up throat. So when I’m breathing hard, I can’t really speak. That’s why I didn’t talk when I came in. Still had to calm down.” She had a strange, unidentifiable accent, and her voice was oddly raspy. Maybe her muteness messed with how she formed words.  
“So… it’s only when you’re on runs?”  
Now she looked apologetic. “Is that, um, is that a problem?”  
“Oh—no! Hey, that’s cool! We can work with that! It’s just a shame—Simon usually likes someone to harmonize with him when he sings on runs.”  
Five laughed. It was odd—kind of quiet and breathy and two-toned—but really nice.  
“Hey and maybe we could work out some kind of Morse code! You know Morse?”  
She shook her head.  
“Ah, neither do I. But we could learn it! I’ll bet you my rations Janine could teach us something.”  
She smiled. “That sounds nice.”  
There was a silence, where Sam was caught thinking about how nice Five’s eyes were until he realized that was all she had to say. She seemed like she wanted to continue the conversation, but didn’t know where to go from there. Well, good thing Sam was used to talking.  
“Hey, you should’ve seen Ed the other day—you remember Ed? The bloke with the motorcycle? Janine’s sure glad you picked him up—we were in desperate need of a mechanic. Anyway a couple days ago, Cheryl—one of the cooks?—was mentioning how she missed basil in her dishes. And Ed overheard and was like “We don’t have any basil? I can get some.” And we all thought he was just joking, but then he whips out his motorbike and says “I’ll be back in a jiffy”. Apparently back at his old house, he had a whole garden full of potted spices! Wait—not important, not important—anyway as he’s driving back there’s a swarm directly in the way. Janine tells him to go around, find some other route, but he just goes “No thanks. I’ll handle it.” And he grabs – you know those old metal rubbish bin lids? The circular ones? He grabs one of those, jams it in front of his handlebars, and uses it like a shield like—”  
“Like Captain America?”  
“Yes! Exactly like that! I mean—those movies were cool, right? I wasn’t, like, a nerd or anything, but I watched a few of them.”  
“You watched all of them, didn’t you?”  
Sam spluttered. Not only could Five talk, she was also sassy apparently. Her smile was kind and teasing, though, so he didn’t feel too bad. “I… might have! They’re good movies!”  
“They are,” Five agreed.  
“I remember one time one of my mates at Uni tried to do this one move from the movies. Was hilarious for us but he wasn’t allowed on the campus commons after that…”  
Sam continued on the whole lunch like that, telling stories about this and that. Honestly, he wasn’t used to talking that much. Sure, he talked a lot on cams but that was usually out of worry. Something about Five made everything easier, made him open up about things he didn’t usually mention. Maybe it was her smile. Maybe it was that she laughed at all his jokes (even the dumb ones). Probably it was because she was so quiet, he felt like a balloon finally let open and blowing out air. In the back of his mind, Sam wondered if she’d ever try being a therapist. She’d be good at it.  
He didn’t want to admit how disappointed he was Janine’s voice came on the overhead, calling all runners for Decoy Duty. Five’s face, which had been smiling pleasantly until that point, seemed to shut down. Her eyes hardened, and she picked up her bowl.  
Sam didn’t like how serious she looked. “Well, have a good run, I guess. Hey! And you know what! I heard some rumors—just rumors, Janine won’t let me confirm anything—about a game store some blocks from here. I bet I could convince Janine to send you!”  
Five paused. “Me?”  
“Well, yeah. If I trust anyone to get some good games for Abel, it’s Runner Five,” he said honestly. He chose not to mention that the last time they had sent Simon out for “fun stuff”, he had brought back tanning oil and some whiskey.  
She took the compliment with a slight blush. Right before leaving, she turned back toward him. “Have you ever played Catan?” she asked.  
Sam grinned, “You bet your rations I have.”  
Two weeks later, the game showed up on his desk. Three weeks later, the game was banned on account of the “distractions it posed to daily work”. (Janine was just a sore loser.)

* * *

Five didn’t sit alone much anymore. Sam wasn’t sure what it was that flipped the switch—the board game supply run, maybe? Some stories of her awesome running? Maybe it took Van Ark’s attack on Abel to get people to trust her—people tended to unite in the face of a common evil. Either way, three months in, Runner Five was finally gaining her place on the team. It wasn’t a surprise to Sam; he trusted her from the start. But it did make him smile to see her warm up with Kytan or goof off with Simon.

A weird kind of warmth bloomed in his chest whenever Janine mentioned how well Five did on a mission, or how smart she was to escape a zomb. All credit to Five, obviously, but well… couldn’t he be a little proud that he brought her in? He would think about Alice sometimes, when Five would leap a chasm or outsmart a zombie. He thought Alice would be proud of the person who took up her mantle. 

Sure, Abel was in ruins after the rocket launcher mishap. Van Ark was a looming threat and the zombies never seemed to slow up, but one time he and Five and Archie played a really horrible game of croquet (using scrap wire and apples), and suddenly things weren’t so bad.

* * *

“How does someone even become ‘partially mute’?” Simon teased once, on a Friday after a long mission. The Runners were gathered in the Rec Room, playing ping-pong on a makeshift table and drinking the worst gin Sam had ever tasted.

Five was sticking to water, but she looked open and relaxed, the most comfortable Sam had ever seen her. “Why does it matter? You do enough talking for the both of us on runs.”

The group snickered, but Sarah piped up. She was on a nearby stool, cleaning her favored knife. “I am actually curious about that, too. Seems like some kind of witch’s curse. Can only speak while standing still.”

Five laughed, but shifted under all the attention on her. “Oh, it’s not that big of a deal. After the outbreak, I survived by sealing myself in my flat. Survived for a few weeks but I started getting sick. Couldn’t escape out the door because there were zombies locked in the lobby. Couldn’t escape out the window because I was six floors up. Then one day, some people from Mullins were patrolling the area. I just kept shouting and shouting to get their attention until they noticed me. The doctor told me that permanently ruined my voice.”

A few people nodded. Sarah frowned, “What, the shouting?”

“Uh, yeah?”

“You got a messed-up voice just from shouting?” Simon asked incredulously.

“You got a messed-up face just from being born, mate,” Maggie snickered, while she simultaneously thwacked him with a well-hit ping pong ball.

But Sarah just wouldn’t let up. “You live with your family in that flat, Five?”

Five wrapped her hands around her bottle, like a nervous tick. “Uh, no. I lived alone.”

“You have any family? Alive or dead, I mean.”

Sam saw Five glance at him, then back at Sarah. “Yeah, I did.”

Sam didn’t know where Sarah was going with this, or why she cared so much about the answers. He thought about his parents, what happened to _him_ when the outbreak hit. He didn’t much like to talk about it either.

“Hey, um Five! I was just going through some of the board games you brought from that Possum Place toy store! You ever play Pandemic?”

Runner 13 groaned. “Sam, you’re kidding. You really want to play that game? In a _zombie apocalypse?”_

“I’d like to think we’d be better at it, now that we’ve actually experienced it in real life!”

13 scoffed, but Five had moved toward him, still clutching her water bottle. “I’ll play.”

“Hey, fantastic!” he grinned, and she smiled back.

Simon cracked his knuckles and swung a chair over. “Oh, I’m so in. I’ll crush you all at this.”

“Simon,” Jody said, “It’s a teamwork game. We work together?”

“My statement still stands.”

Twenty minutes later they were deep into strategy, with the extra runners forming a circle around the table, shouting advice. The room was warm with laughter, but also buzzing with anticipation. Like anything the runners did, they seemed to take this as another mission. Stages in, when the pandemic was at its most powerful, Simon and Jody were arguing about Five’s next move. The whole team, actually, was fighting over it.

“She should fly to Bogota!” “But then she’ll only save this part!” “If she moves here she can—’ “But she doesn’t have that many turns—” “What if she—”

Quietly, among the ruckus, Five took her piece, and gently set it in a new place.

Sam looked at the board. “Wait, Five, did you just save that whole section?”

Simon looked down, too. He counted the pieces and then said: “Huh. Why didn’t I think of that?” 

Jody was still upset, “Well, if you had listened to me—”

“Oh please, your plan was nowhere near that!”

Aside from the chaos, Sam turned to Five and smiled. “Hey fantastic move. You’re ace at this.”

For a split second, she looked a like a deer in headlights, before smiling back at him. Suddenly, Sam was starting to feel a little like a deer in the headlights, too. 


	3. Chapter 3

The happiest Sam ever saw Five was when she was with Archie, playing with the new puppy. They’d go out in the main yard, doing warm ups with the shepherd nipping at their heels. Janine had a strong policy of no pets in the township, so technically, the dog didn’t exist. There was, however, a paper posted in the commons, asking for name suggestions. Sam wrote ‘Sam Jr.’ He could dream, couldn’t he?

Sometimes he’d get a little too hopeful, like when Maxine thought she had the zombie-killing spray, or when the hordes seemed to let up for a while. He’d see Five playing football with some kids in the swap shop and he’d let himself think about a future without zombies.

He didn’t know why he always felt so betrayed when things inevitably went to shit again. Why he let himself be so happy that day when Five burst in to the comm’s shack, holding Archie’s five-month-old puppy. She had been smiling brightly, her hair down around her shoulders, her eyes sparkling.

“Sam! I taught him to sit!”

“Uh, great. You do know you’re supposed to be out there, right now, right?”

She froze. “What?”

“The mission? Invading Dunderwood Village base? Van Ark?”

She had looked genuinely surprised, which made the situation all the funnier.

“That was today?”

“Uh, yes?”

“Oh, shit! I’m sorry!” she cried, dashing across the shack and lunging for her headset.

Sam blinked hard and analyzed what he just heard. “Did you just turn Canadian?” he inquired, before getting a canine tossed at him.

“Watch him until we get back, will you?” She rapidly pulled her hair into a messy ponytail. “Feed him some scraps by six, if we aren’t back by then.”

“Well, sure, but can I just ask why you suddenly sounded—”

“You’re the best, Sam!” she called, and just before she left, she sent him an award-winning smile. Sam’s stomach flipped a few times, for no good reason, before the door slammed shut. He turned to look down at the dog, who had yet to be named. It panted at him, big brown eyes and a bigger pink tongue just flopping over everything. Five’s mood had rubbed off on him, and now it even looked like the dog was smiling.

“Well, that’s alright. You can sit with me until Archie comes back, huh?”

Except Archie didn’t come back that day. Neither did Five’s award-winning smile. Happiness had a limit in a zombie apocalypse, he had to remind himself. Nothing was ever going to last that long.

* * *

(S2M43)

When Runner Eight’s voice went off the air, Sam kind of felt like kicking something. Simon had betrayed them, the Major was dead, and Sarah… well, his mind was still processing what she had done. She had hurt Five, hurt Janine, but then saved them all. He didn’t… he needed to spend some time to think about it.

He closed his eyes and took a centering breath. Back to protocol. Collect all runners. The run was over. Paula and Five were settled near a bank of trees, free from zombies but about 20 minutes from Abel. Sarah’s body was lifeless between them. Jamie was much further off, out of visual. He probably had enough petrol left in the bike to make a trip.

“Head back to base guys. I’ll have Jamie… well, I’ll have Jamie carry Sarah’s body on the bike. I…”

Beside him, Janine was leaving. She was grabbing her papers, surely off to rethink their strategies, process Runner 3’s betrayal. At the last moment, though, she flipped around, and leaned down at the cams, squinting. 

“Sam,” she said. Her tone was tense.

“Hm?”

“Is that _Five’s_ breathing?”

Sam frowned. He heard nothing. Then again, Five was always quiet. She kept her mic tucked under her hair; really no point for it if she wasn’t going to speak on a run. Plus, her breathing was always raspy. Sam tended to tune it out. 

This time, though, he cranked the volume up. He had thought the mic was crackling. Turns out it was Five. Her breathing was erratic, crackling and sporadically pausing. It was so fast it almost didn’t sound real. The run was over, Sam thought. They hadn’t been running for a good ten minutes now. She shouldn’t sound like that. 

“Uh, Five? Are you… you okay there?”

Five had a headcam on. She shook her head wildly.

“Can you—can you speak? Paula what’s going on?”

“Oh, she’s shaking. Runner Five? Can you look at me?”

 _Oh, no. Oh no oh no oh no._ In the chaos of the day, he had almost forgotten Van Ark had taken Five captive. Like an idiot, he had hoped Van Ark had just locked her away somewhere. Maybe use her for a bartering chip later on. 

Hearing Five panic, Sam felt short of breath, too. “What’s going on? Did she get bit?”

“Calm down, Yao.”

“But if she got bit we need to know!”

Janine leaned in to the mics, “Dr.Cohen, is this some sort of response to shock?”

“She seemed fine running after Simon!” Sam cried.

Paula’s voice was quiet. “She’s got a mild fever and her heart rate’s over 100 and she… oh, these are the after effects.”

“After effects of what?” Janine demanded, “Paula, what did Van Ark do to Five?”

“Oh my god,” Sam breathed. “He injected her with something didn’t he?”

“He must’ve given her his newest version of Experiment Seven.”

“Do you know what’s in it?” Janine asked.

“No. I don’t even know what it’s supposed to do. We need to get her back to Abel, to monitor her. With the adrenaline crash, this could hit her hard.”

Sam scrambled for some idea. He ran through his list of runners—who could get there first?

“Oh! The bikes! Can we get New Canton on their quad bikes?”

Janine assented. “It’ll work. I’ll call for them immediately.”

“D’zzy,” Five managed to slur.

“Alright, let’s lay back then, shall we?” Paula soothed.

Sam was left alone then, with Paula cradling a trembling Five, her breathing all over the place. The only thing Sam had was the two of them as dots in a field, and Five’s headcam rattling away, making him feel like he was about to break apart. He couldn’t help her. Couldn’t see her face or her hear talk. He needed to grab on to something but all he had was a wooden desk and some shitty, shitty screens.

Paula started murmuring when Five’s mouth opened, making her gasp like a beached fish.

“What’s happening to her?” he asked in the silence.

“She’s going through a form of withdrawal. Think about it this way: she was hopped up on drugs, then sent on a fast-paced sprint through the woods. She had to crash at one point.”

Sam whimpered, at the end of his wits. He didn’t want to ask whether she’d be okay. He didn’t think he could stand to lose another person today.

“Hey, Five,” he called, with nothing more he could do. “You’re gonna be okay. The docs are going to fix you up. You’re going to be just fine.”

Five’s breaths echoed in his hear. Above that, he heard tapping. The Morse code he and Five had been practicing. Hitting up against her mic. _Dit dit dit. Dash dash dash. Dit dit dit._ Again and on repeat. She didn’t stop until the bikes came.

* * *

The Canton quad bikes arrived in under ten minutes, and by then her breathing had eased. Maxine had already been by to calm Sam down, saying if the drugs were deadly, they would’ve already killed Five by now. Sam didn’t know how that was supposed to make him feel better. 

He would’ve met Five at the gate if half the population of Abel hadn’t swarmed him, asking for updates on the mission. He didn’t know where Simon was. He didn’t know who was in charge after the Major. And he didn’t want to talk about Runner 8 at all.

Five was in the hospital when he got there, being examined by Maxine. When he saw her sitting up on her own, he almost collapsed in relief. When he lurched toward her, however, she recoiled violently. 

Paula grabbed his arm, dragging him backward. “Let’s give Five some space, shall we?” she said, as if Sam was a child.

Sam wasn’t a child, but he kind of felt like one when he took enough time to look Five over. She was twitching like an addict. Her eyes were a seeping dark, her pupils blown wide and shifting to the doctors, to him, then to things no one could see. There was a red rash around her neck. She flinched every time Maxine’s hands drifted near it.

“Five? Can you hear me alright?”

Her body shuddered and twitched. It looked a monumental effort to get her mouth started. “’mm not _deaf_ , Sam.” Another full-body twitch. “Just mute.”

Sam exhaled, feeling ten times lighter with a breathy laugh. “I know, I know. Just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

She nodded, her eyes still trained on the floor in front of her. Maxine, looking sorry, turned to Sam and Paula. “I’d like to do a full check for bites. Sam, would you mind?”

Twenty minutes later, after a good pace in the darkened halls, Maxine slipped out. She seemed calm, and so Sam felt he should be calm. _It’s fine_ , he told himself even before hearing Maxie, _Five’s tough as hell._

 _“_ She’s American,” Maxine stated. “Did you know that?”

Sam blinked, not at all the news he was expecting. “What?”

“I don’t know _what_ kind of accent she had before but that girl is born and bred Midwest. Her accent started slipping when I gave her some low-grade pain meds. She asked for a bandaid, Sam. A _bandaid._ How did she get this far without us noticing?”

Sam tried to process that, and then decided that, of all the surprises that happened today, that was the least important.

“But she’s alright, though?”

“She’s going to be just fine. I think the drugs have mostly worked through her body. I’m having Paula take her back to her bunk but… I came to you for a reason.”

“Okay…?”

Maxine’s voice was soft in the quiet hallway. She sounded hesitant, opened and closed her mouth more than once before starting.

“Five is very sensitive about her neck…”

“Yeah, I noticed that. It was all red and sore-looking. I’d be sensitive about it, too.”

“Yes, well, except even before today. When I would do basic med checks, she didn’t like me touching her neck.”

Sam just looked at Maxine expectantly. She was clearly going somewhere with this, but Sam didn’t follow.

“And today I did a thorough examination, just to make sure there weren’t any unexpected symptoms of her time with Van Ark.”

“Yeah?”

“I examined her throat, and there was no scar tissue. There was an issue with her trachea; one of her vocal cords was paralyzed.”

“Yeah, she told me that once. Said her vocal cords are all messed up.”

“But there wasn’t any evidence of scarring via infection. It’s just—Five had told us she had become mute because she had essentially ‘screamed’ her voice out while she was sick with the flu. Now, I’m no otolaryngologist, but that story doesn’t seem to add up. If I’m correct, she’s suffering from the effects of leftover contusions.”

Maxine looked at him. Sam waited. 

“Maxie, um, I don’t know where you’re going with this, but does it really matter how—”

“What I’m trying to say is: she’s lying about how she lost her voice. I’m seeing evidence of some major damage to her trachea and esophagus. And with the way she protects her neck instinctually around others… that’s evidence of some form of violence.”

“So, she got into a fight in the street one night?”

Maxine’s frowned deepened. “People don’t usually fight like that, Sam. It looks like… well, to me it looks like abuse.”

The word hung in the air, ugly and forceful. His brain skipped a few times, struggling to match Five with the idea. Five was tough as hell. She wasn’t afraid of anyone, barely even blinked in the face of a zombie horde. _But that’s not what this is, is it?_ Sam chided himself. _This is something different._

 _“_ I’m telling you this not because it’s going to affect her runs, but because someone should know. Someone… close to her.”

If it was important, Janine should know. Or maybe the heads at New Canton but… Maxine had come to him because he was Five’s friend. With Archie, Sarah, even Simon gone, Sam might be Five’s _only_ remaining friend. 

Sam kind of wanted to have a good cry. Mostly, though, he wanted to go check on Five. 

“This happened before she arrived at Abel, right? Pre-apocalypse and everything?”

Maxine nodded. “The injury looks more than two years old.”

“Thanks for letting me know, Maxie. It sounds like it was in the past, though. If Five wants to move on from it, I’m going to let her. God knows there’s something _everyone_ in Abel is happy to leave in the pre-apocalypse world.

“A fresh start,” Maxine suggested.

Sam smiled. “A fresh start.”

* * *

Maxine had instructed that someone keep an eye on Five while she slept through the withdrawal. When Sam arrived in the runner’s barracks, Jody was on guard. He met her outside Five’s room, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed.

Sometimes Sam thanked God Jody was short, because right now she looked like she would otherwise bowl someone over. 

“So, you heard about Simon,” he guessed.

Jody made a face. “No, duh. This place isn’t big enough to keep secrets.”

“I’m sorry, Jody. I know you two were close.”

“Pfft, close-ish. He was a bloody tosser most of the time. Plus a terrible shot. Should’ve never trusted a man with that bad a shot,” she muttered. 

“And,” he cleared his throat, not knowing if he should whisper. “And Five?”

The flame sputtered in Jody’s eye. “She’s fine I suppose. Would probably like to hear your voice. I know it calms most of us runners. Whatever you do, _don’t_ bring up Runner 8. It’ll get her agitated and Maxine’s trying to get her to sleep off the drugs.”

The mention of Runner 8 was too fresh, too new in his mind. He decided to ignore it, think about it another time. Right now, Five needed help.

“So she’s awake?”

“In a sense. I think Maxie also gave her something to calm her down. She sounds all weird. She’s talking like some kind of character out of a movie.”

“Like an American movie?” he said tiredly. Jody nodded.

There was a pause, and Sam reached for something to say, to comfort maybe, but nothing came. He was working on 24 hours of no sleep now, mashed up with a whole lot of trauma. He was usually good at talking to his runners but today was just a no good very bad day.

Jody huffed, then got up to leave. “I’m gonna go knit for a while. See if Janine needs help. Maybe kick a wall, who knows.” And with that agenda, she was gone.

Finally alone, Sam stepped into the room feeling kind of self-conscious. He realized he’d never been in here before. He spent a lot of time in the runner’s rec room and had stopped in a few of the runner’s private rooms before (Simon’s was an absolute nightmare. And Janine thought _his_ commshack was bad.) Five’s room was dark, lit only by the tower and gate lights in the distance. It was clean mostly, with a few trainers lined up at the door and a sports bra peeking out of a makeshift drawer. It smelled surprisingly nice, he realized, like roses and sandalwood and other smells he would probably be able to name if he wore fancy lotions. The source was a whole set of candles stacked on the nightstand. He grinned, remembering that run when Five may or may not have snuck away to an abandoned spa and he may or may not have helped her in return for some nice fuzzy slippers. Candles were not allowed in the barracks but sometimes the little rules were meant to be bent.

“Sam?” a voice called from the bed, distinct with its raspy hum. He startled. Honestly, he had forgotten why he had gone in there. Now he just felt like some kind of peeping tom. “UH, oh hi! Um, sorry about that. Didn’t mean to wake you. I was just told to keep watch but clearly you’re doing fine so I’ll just be…”

“Sam I don’t like this.”

Sam blinked a few times and in the dim light he saw Five curled up in her ratty bed, gripping at a pillow. Hearing her now he knew she was still pretty drugged, but also extremely tired. It couldn’t have been a good feeling.

“Oh, hey—it’s okay. What don’t you like? Do you—you want another blanket or something?”

“Sam she’s dead.”

Oh. Oh boy.

“Sarah’s dead and I killed her.”

Sam’s heart ached, and he tried to settle next to her. He didn’t think she wanted him to touch her, but he also hated standing there like some bum.

“No, Five, you didn’t kill her. Van Ark killed her. And none of it is your fault.”

“Sam, I don’t –I do’t like this.”

“Huh?”

“The drugs. I don’t—”

“You’re just burning them off. We don’t know what Van Ark gave you, but it should be over soon—”

“Not _that_. I don’t like drugs. I don’t like feeling like this. This… this fake happiness.” 

“Do you mean… what Maxine gave you?”

“Sam,” Five said, with a sudden clarity. It was the most conscious he had heard her all night. “Morphine. Dilaudid. Tell Maxine not to give me it again.”

Sam blinked. He nodded. “Sure. Okay. I’ll let her know.”

A second went by, then another. Then, suddenly, but quietly, Five said, “Uh oh.”

“What’s wrong?”

Five’s eyes flickered from him to her wall. She was looking increasingly sheepish and panicked. “Listen, I may have—um, I may not exactly be… British.”

Sam laughed despite himself. “Yeah, you kind of lost your cover with the drugs, didn’t you?”

“I was faking it. I didn’t want anyone—people might be suspicious.”

“Hey, it’s cool. You’re American—so is Maxine. Which part of America are you from?”

Five’s mouth tightened. She curled up closer. Sam could read the signs. Clearly, it was an off-limits question. His eyes drifted to Five’s neck, where her hand brushed protectively. He thought about how the apocalypse was awful, but sometimes kind of nice. To forget. To restart.

“Five, if you don’t want to talk about your past, I’m never going to make you.” Her eyes flicked up at him. She looked wary. “You don’t have to tell me anything about yourself. Or any of Abel really, to get us to trust you. The way you are on missions—how you were with the zombie device today? You’re—well, you’re _brilliant_. I don’t care what country you came from; I trust you with my life.”

He could tell Five understood. But he wasn’t done. “You don’t need to fake an accent in front of us. No one’s gonna ask questions, because—I mean, you’re _Five._ But, if you ever do want to talk, I’m here okay? I—I’m all ears.”

Five remained quiet. Sam was fine with that. Not asleep, but not willing to talk. It was probably past midnight now, Sam realized, but sleep wasn’t coming soon. Not after today. Not for a while. 

He shook his head. Some day he’d think more about losing Sarah, losing Simon. But for now, safe back in Abel, he just needed a distraction.

“Hey, did I ever tell you the story of when I jumped off a building at Uni?”

Five shook her head.

“Want to hear it?”

She nodded.

So he laid back and talked and in the quiet of the room with the scent of teakwood and marmalade et cetera et cetera, he and Five tried to forget the world.


	4. Chapter 4

People seemed to get funny ideas about Five, the more famous she became. They saw her as intimidating, aloof.

Sam didnt understand it. Sure she was quiet; she had always been quiet. On runs she had a mean poker face. And when Archie died, some part of five had died with her. But she was never _scary_.

Cool, kickass five. Like a terminator. “She’s so badass” a girl guide once said, after Five shot two zombies with one bullet. And, well okay that part was true. But she also had a reputation as heartless.

“I heard that when Runner Eight died, she didn’t even grieve. She ran the next day.”

Of course, no one knew that sometimes Five listened to music on long runs, really awful 1980s ABBA-level stuff.

They didn’t know about her dog Chicken Nugget, and how she searched an entire shopping mall to find him little booties for the cold.

They didn't know that her cams would stray from the path sometimes, toward the sky on a stunning blue day or across the horizon during a scarlet sunset.

“What are you looking at Five?” he’d ask. “There aren’t any zombies for a few kilometers.”

 _Beautiful,_ she’d tap out in Morse code. _Beautiful,_ she’d say, and she’d tilt her headcam toward a giant willow and pause for just a moment.

Five once managed to sneak a handful of flowers into the township. He only knew because they ended up on his desk, with a note that said ‘You said your mom grew lilies. I thought these were very pretty’.

She did. They were.

Five liked to play Demons and Darkness with him and Maxine. She chose to be the forest druid, her figurine painted with green. “I am one with the trees” she’d say jokingly, wiggling her eyebrows. And sometimes, with the way she ran, it almost felt true.

Things in Abel were turning to shit. Half the population was gone. The world was filled with mind control and zombies. But he trusted Five to get to the bottom of it. Five was the best, the smartest runner he knew. He depended on her more than he realized.

But then Moonchild came. 

When Moonchild took her, he felt the floor drop out from under him.

After Moonchild, Five never really came back.

* * *

(S3M44)

Five wasn’t happy about the mission even before it started. He should’ve realized that. Should’ve been more wary. Five never questioned the missions out loud. Even the ones he _knew_ she wasn’t happy with, her briefings were always impeccable. Today she actually scowled, and asked twice, “So why am _I_ the guinea pig here?”

Isabel was patient. The way that she spoke to Five was so calming and slow, Sam almost started to agree that Five was being childish. “You’re the best viable runner Abel has, yes? If you fall under mind control, the rest of Abel falls, too. You need to protect your best line of defense.”

“Yeah, Five! You’re head of runners now, aren’t you? Gotta lead the pack a little?” he teased, knowing she only accepted the position grudgingly. Sam was just outright proud of her; no one deserved it more than Five.

( “I’m not a leader,” she had said, sounding wary and a little uncomfortable after receiving the golden badge. “I’m just quiet Five.” Sam wasn’t worried at all. “I don’t think you need to have big speeches to be a good leader Five. I think you just need to care for Abel. And you’ve got _that_ down pat.” )

Thinking back on it, he was an arsehole for ignoring her worries, pressuring her into the field. And he was a dolt for letting her out of his sight.

Isabel got annoyed by his antics very quickly. When she asked him to leave he mostly just felt bad for getting in her way. When Jody saw him, twenty minutes later, he was in the kitchens, sneaking some fish and chips while he waited. He didn’t expect Jody to be so furious.

“Sam, where the _bloody_ hell have you been?”

“Me?”

“Yes, you! Runner Six and Runner Eighteen have been waiting on you. And _why_ is your commshack locked?”

“But Isabel said—wait, what? It’s locked?”

That was unusual. He had told Isabel days ago that the commshack always needed to be accessible, and _he_ certainlydidn’t lock it when he went out.

“Today was Isabel’s hypnosis thing with Five. I thought Six’s run was pushed back until—”

Jody didn’t let him finish. “Wait, Five’s outside the gates? Didn’t Janine say it should be done around the track?”

Now both Jody and he were confused. Sam tried to get his story straight. Who was it that told him the location had been switched? How had the schedules been so messed up? With both Janine and the doctors gone, things had been a little unorganized. 

“Well, she’ll be okay, right? She’s got the ZRD with her.”

“The ZRD?” Jody squawked, “The _sometimes broken_ ZRD? The ZRD that Janine said not to use until she got back??”

“She… what?”

“Sam,” Jody said, and her voice shook a little, “Why would Isabel lock the doors?”

They looked at each other. Then Sam started running.

The commshack door was flung open when they reached the building. Inside, the chair was knocked over, his cup of tea spilled. The desk that was always covered in his memos and maps was empty. There was a warning beeping out—zombies were approaching the runner. Isabel was gone. And Five was in danger.

Sam scrambled for his headphones. “Five! Five, can you read me?”

Five didn’t respond in morse or voice, and her breathing was raggedy like she was afraid.

“Runner Five, can you hear me?” he repeated, “Isabel’s gone. She’s misdirected you. You need to run south.”

The dot on the screen kept moving, west and west and west. She wasn’t reacting. She wasn’t redirecting.

“Something’s wrong,” Sam breathed. “The mics are all on but she doesn’t—she isn’t—Jody.” He met her eyes, and the fear they shared was palpable. “You need to go after her.” She sprinted out, speeding through the township and dodging from the gates as soon as they rose.

Sam scrambled for some help. He reached for the telephone, thinking to contact someone. Janine, he realized. Maxine, Paula, anyone. They were all gone. He had no one to turn to. Instead, he hit the general alarm, calling any available runner to the gates. 

Maybe Five would slow. Maybe Five could still hear him.

“I’ve sent out Jody to help, but I can’t get a good fix on your location. The woods around you are too dense. What is going on, Five? Where the hell did she send you?”

Five’s headcam was shaking, she kept glancing backwards, but nothing was on her. “Five, what do you keep looking at? The zombies are to your right a hundred yards. Where are you going?”

She was panicking. He had heard her breathing for months now, he knew when she was genuinely afraid. She was at a dead man’s run, being chased by something that didn’t exist.

 _The hypnosis,_ Sam realized. _The hypnosis went all wrong. “_ Augh, what’s she done to you? You’ve got to resist this. Just listen to my voice. You’ve got to slip out of it!”

But she didn’t stop. She wouldn’t listen. Suddenly and embarrassingly, it hit him. What Isabel had done. Why she had left. Moonchild wanted Five. She wanted the ZRD. He felt like a skydiver, who hadn’t realized his pack wasn’t opening, and had only now seen the ground rushing up to meet him.

“Okay, Runner Four is closing on your position. Listen for her. She’ll be coming down that mud track to your left. She’s there to help, Five. You know her. It’s Jody!”

Jody was lagging behind. She wasn’t going to make it. They were reaching the boundary of the signal, if they went any further he wouldn’t be able to help!

“Jody, grab Runner Five’s pack! One burst of speed, come on!”

Jody’s headcam was blurred. They were both moving so fast. Things started cutting out. He heard a grunt and a crash. Static. Running. He held his breath and prayed to God.

Jody’s cam came back online. In her hands, Five’s backpack with the ZRD. No one else in sight.

“Sam,” Jody said, and her voice was wavery with panting and fear. From her cam, he could see the continued forest of trees. A flash of movement, Five not looking back. “Sam, she’s gone.” In the background, Abel’s sirens were still ringing. A gust of lonely air blew past Jody.

And Sam was left in his empty shack, Five’s comm blinking out of existence, and the floor dropping out from under him.

* * *

(S3M46) 

When the news came in about the Commansys flotilla, Sam knew it was Five. He waited to be told–he didn’t _want_ it to be true–but hundreds of casualties? A lightning quick attack? Five was powerful. It was incredible, the things she could do. Five was Moonchild’s most valuable weapon. Just like she had been Abel’s most valuable shield.

There had been sightings of Five. She was everywhere, according to Rofflenet. Like a ghost or a shadow or some kind of Winter Soldier. Just like Captain America, Sam thought miserably.

Sometimes he’d hear the tones from a distance, echoing in the empty night. He’d think about Maxine, and the way she had been so disturbling peaceful when she was under control. Her face had been all passive, her eyes droopy and mouth smiling pleasantly. _I was happy,_ Maxine had said, honestly. _But the happiness was forced on me. It wasn’t really mine._

Sam thought about Five that one night after Sarah, when she was coming off of the drugs. _I don’t like it. The fake happiness._ Sam wanted to retch.

He wanted to drop everything, run out there himself, and fight until he got her back. But…well, first of all, he ran like a tortoise. With his luck he’d get bitten before he reached the first tree line. More importantly, he had a job here. He had a duty to Abel. 

Weeks passed. _Weeks._ And Sam was nowhere near finding her. When the figure appeared two months later, and the gates were opened to the hordes, a weird kind of peace settled over him. He knew who it was. It was Moonchild, and she was using Five. They were back. They were here for the ZRD.

He made it there before Five did, miraculously. He watched the door open, saw her outline. She was holding an axe. She wasn’t even good with axes. Moonchild had changed Five in so many ways but somehow that was the kicker.

“Hello, Five.”

Five didn’t move. She looked like a statue, barely panting, her arms loose at her sides. Abel was in ruins around them; Sam could hear the chaos. In his earpiece, Janine was shouting commands, Maxine was gathering the children, Runner 17 had fallen and no one could figure out how to close the gate.

The chaos in his ear and the silence in front of him clashed surreally. Here, in Janine’s office, it was just him and Five. Just him, and this horrible shell of Moonchild’s Five. He had been planning this encounter for a long time, he realized. What to say to this clone of Five.

He stood between her and the locked cabinet. She stared him down.

“Hey, Five, I knew it was going to be you. I felt your presence.” He tried for a smile, “Yeah, that’d be a better joke if it was Christmas.”

Janine had heard him over the chaos. She asked where he was.

“Five’s here,” he responded, a finger to his ear. He didn’t dare break eye contact. “I’m okay, just need a bit of help. Five’s here.”

Her body was thinner than before, all muscle and no fat. Her jersey was torn, the number almost unrecognizable. Her shoes were gone, an empty bag on her back. Her face was washed out, lit by the flashing red of the emergency lights. It made her face like a skull; her eye sockets deep and her jaw cut thin. She was tired, he could tell. But her eyes were wide. Five’s eyes looked past him like he was a ghost. They were glossy, hardened but distant. They flickered just a little. 

“It’s not you, you know? Something’s happened to you. But I know you’re in there. I do! I just feel it. The thing is…” 

Her lips were a thin line, stuck in a closed smile like some painful clown face. The skin around her eyes and mouth were tight. It shivered, flickered, like the smile hurt her, like it killed her. 

“Look, I’ve watched you all run so much. I don’t even need cams half the time. I’d know who was who by the sound of your steps. And I can hear it in yours now. You’re not running like yourself. You sound like one of those drones! Mechanical, each step the same.”

Silence, but Sam felt brave. “Except,” he said, “Except sometimes, just for a second, you go back to yourself, your own rhythm.” Five ran like a powerhouse. She ran like a fox. She powered up hills and she skidded around turns and he knew who Five was, down to every last sound. “I know you’re in there, Five. I know you can fight it.”

Again, her eyes flickered. He dared to step towards her. He ached to reach out and help. But then a sound echoed out of her earpiece. The tones sounded in her ears. Her eyes lost focus, falling up and to the right.

She moved forward.

“Five, no, please.”

She raised her ax. He stuttered backward.

“This isn’t you. You don’t want to do this!”

A crash, he tripped over Janine’s desk. He raised his hands, defenseless. He begged her to listen. The tones only rang louder. Her head tilted sideways, the light in her eyes completely gone. 

“No! Help! Someone, help!”

The tones were at full volume, they rang in his ears and he closed his eyes and suddenly there was a bang.

“Runner Five, get down on the ground!” Janine’s voice demanded. She was at the door, a gun in hand.

“No!” Sam cried, just as Five slammed the butt of her ax across his head, making him see stars.

There was a commotion, he tried to get back up. Two shots went off. A pane of glass shattered.

Suddenly, Janine was at his side. “Mr. Yao are you alright?”

He must’ve blacked out. The room was empty. The sirens still rang. “I—where’s?”

“She escaped. The ZRD’s safe but she escaped.”

Sam felt like crying. He felt like shouting. He also felt a little like he was going to lose his lunch. “No! But I saw her! She was in there, Janine! She was in there!”

Janine’s face was stone in the flashing lights. Her eyes were heavy. “I followed her out, Sam. Didn’t manage to get a single shot on her. But… by the way she was stumbling, I don’t think she was doing so well.”


	5. Chapter 5

(S3M49)

Sam wasn’t allowed to see Five when she finally came back. He thought that was the biggest injustice of all. He had worked so hard on her rescue for months, but the actual mission to inject her with anti-mind control, to bring her back home, he had to leave that to Simon and Amelia. Possibly the two people who least deserved to help Five home. The irony.

Her return was so hush-hush, the gates didn’t even open. Janine signaled her to a side entrance, to a portion in the walls that had recently been destroyed. “Until we _know_ it’s Five,” Janine had told him quietly, in a voice that would have wavered was it not coming from Janine. “We will not alert the residents.” The unspoken truth was there: Abel was still in ruins from her last attack. Nothing would be worse than believing Five was back, and then being wrong _again_.

“Can I at least be there?” he pleaded, “If it’s really her, she has to be hurting.”

Janine’s eyes flicked towards the mess of papers behind him, the three empty coffee mugs, and the cot he had installed since operating had become an 24/7 gig. “She’ll manage, Mr. Yao,” was all she said, and then she told him to get some sleep.

He didn’t, of course. He waited in his chair until night hit, and watched on fuzzy screens as Five was escorted back into Abel, lead by Janine, flagged by two Ministry guards. She was just a dot, a silhouette, and he tried to imagine what she looked like now, what she and Janine were saying. He watched them all the way, until they entered the hospital, where Maxine would perform all the tests in the world to prove Five was safe.

Then he sat back, thought about how he missed the life where his biggest stress was his engineering exams. 

* * *

Dumbly, at some point in the night, he must’ve nodded off, because he woke up ten hours later, slumped over his desk, a jar of upturned marmite slowly sludging over his sleeve. He hurried outside, searching for a sign of Five but realizing he had no idea where’d she go after the tests. 

_Maybe they’re still at the hospital,_ he thought, and made a beeline for the building. Abel was well awake by now, and the noises of township filled the air. People were rebuilding Barracks 3, the children were walking to school, someone chased after a goat that had got out of its pen. Abel was coming back, just like it always did. The people kept calm and carried on.

He was about to slip into the building, maybe find Maxine or Paula, when he saw her. He almost missed her, moving in his peripheral towards the barracks. 

“Five?!?”

She turned. She was wearing a white shirt, a pair of blue slacks. Someone must’ve lent her them; they certainly weren’t her clothes, nor were they the runner uniform.

When she saw him, she blinked more than once. Her mouth opened, jaw working, but no words came out. For one absurd second, he wondered if the serum had failed, had wiped all her memories or something. _Like 50 First Dates,_ he said to himself, and then wondered why he had chosen that example to describe this.

But then she shook her head. “Sam?” she asked, and her voice was the same old rasp, soft and humming.

He practically tripped over his feet to get to her. “Oh my God, Five! It’s so good to hear your voice! We were so worried. Janine wouldn’t let me see you and I thought—”

When he reached her, his arms were outstretched. She didn’t let him touch her, instead falling back two steps, her arms pulled up around her. 

He stuttered, realizing his mistake. “Right—” he amended, “Right, right sorry. Just came back from a hypnotizing megalomaniac. Probably need your room. Sorry, I just—” He smiled, and then couldn’t stop smiling. “I’m so glad you’re home.”

The glossiness in her eyes was gone, the ugly smile just a bad nightmare. He knew it was her. But she looked tired. Horribly, cram-before-finals-level tired, like she could fall asleep within two heartbeats. Her eyes flickered around his face, like she was analyzing him, like she was confirming something.

“Going to catch up on sleep?” he asked, nodding at the nearby runner’s barracks.

“No. I’m going to report to some ministry agents. They want to know what I remember from the past months.”

“Oh… and what _do_ you remember?”

Her eyes drifted to the bandage on his forehead, where she had jabbed him with the ax. “Not much.”

Sam internally winced. He wished he had removed that bandage beforehand. It wasn’t even that bad of a hit; Maxine said the concussion was minor.

“Five, I know you must feel awful, but—”

“I feel fine, Sam. Maxine cleared me. She ran all the tests.”

Her voice was unnaturally level. She didn’t smile as she talked. 

“That’s good, but that hypnosis—”

She rolled her shoulders, popping joints in her neck. “Listen, Sam, I have to go. Maxine cleared me for a run tomorrow. I’ll see you then.” She turned and left.

* * *

Sam saw Maxine a couple hours later, while she was wrapping a townperson’s knee. She asked him to stay, said she had some reports to give him. Then she pulled him into her office and shut the door behind her.

“Would you do a favor for me?” Maxine asked. Her voice was quiet like it was whenever things were serious. He didn’t like that voice.

“Would you keep an eye on Five? Especially outside of runs?”

“I thought you said she was fine. She’s cleared right? No funny Moonchild business.”

“I know. And I did. But I’m worried she’s unstable. Moonchild may be gone but I’ve done the research, what long term exposure can do to the mind. And we only know _half_ of what Moonchild did to her.”

“So what—so you’re saying she’s lost her marbles? I just saw her.”

“Yes, and wasn’t she a little…”

“She’s fine! She’s always been reserved like that, and it’s not her fault—” Sure, she had been awkward, and a little quiet. But he knew she just needed time. No one could expect to recover in a day.

“Just… watch her for me? We all do things to cope and… well, coming back from Moonchild was hard for me, too. But when I examined her, when she was at her most tired… she skipped a little, like a record player. She may be Five but… Five’s a little changed.”

* * *

(S3M60)

When Moonchild died, he thought it would be over. All those memories of haunting tones and glossy eyes were gone, Abel was safe, everyone was finally _home._ When Five returned from London, flanked by Max and Amelia, he nearly kissed them all. It felt like a new chapter, a fresh start. Janine, Paula, Maxine, and _Five_ –they could all move on.

Or… they _should_ have. Veronica was persistent about the Viking research. Paula was getting worse. And of course—of _course_ the cure had to come from Moonchild, had to be all wrapped up in her research and memories. In the zombie apocalypse, he supposed he should have been used to the irony.

Five was a steady constant through it all. He didn’t see her smile much like she used to, but she was brave as always. She ran just as fast, fought like some kickass female Bond. Tiny as she was, she started holding a presence in meetings. Janine would ask her advice. Abel adored her; the runners respected her. Even New Canton bureaucrats tended to watch themselves around her.

Sam was wary about the hypnosis mission that Maxine was proposing. It felt risky, like bad luck to mess with memories about the dead. If anyone deserved to forget Moonchild, it was Five. She didn’t refuse, though. They spent so long debating it that Sam had almost convinced himself it wasn’t going to happen. 

But then Five was in his commshack, grabbing her headset. “Gonna do the hypnosis today,” she said, and her face was a careful neutral.

He thought that was awfully impulsive. “What if it goes wrong? What if she—what if you can’t snap out of it?”

“Then Janine will stop me,” Five said. And she turned around and left.

At the end of the mission, when the hypnosis broke, Five bent down and threw up three separate times. 

Sam nearly went through the roof with worry.

 _I’m fine,_ she tapped out while he yelled at her through the comms.

“Fine,” she said again, when she made it back to Abel.

“She said she’s fine,” Jody said, when he asked why she wasn’t at supper.

“Has she said anything to you?” Sam asked, “About Moonchild? About her memory?”

Jody winced. “Sam, I don’t think you realize. She hasn’t said anything at all since she got back.”

“What? But that’s—She was talking to Runner 11 the other day!”

Jody shook her head, wouldn’t look away from her plate. “Just missions,” she said. “Just you, and missions.”

* * *

Sam made it a mission to get Five back to her normal self. Well… back to some semblance of normal given the ongoing apocalypse and the constant impending presence of death. 

He tried to invite her to every form of activity: card games and movie nights and DnD sessions. He scoured rofflenet for any not-yet-pillaged pet stores. He even talked to Janine and tried to do a special order of lily-scented bodywash (and yeah, he got a weird look for that).

He even used Baby Sarah as a lure, bringing her around to the Runner’s Barracks whenever he was free, which okay, might have been a little underhanded of him but hey, people loved babies! New hope for the future, and everything! The thing was, Five wasn’t excited about the baby like other people were. When people would flock to Sarah, pass her around like they were taking hits of baby powder, Five kept to the outside ring. When Sarah gurgled at her, she just faintly smiled and kept her hands behind her back. Sure, Five always came back with the best baby gifts for Sarah, but she’d always pass them off, left with only a sticky note of greeting. One time he directly asked her to watch the baby while he ran a quick errand to the greenhouse. She skittered away like a spooked horse:

“Um, I was just about to leave actually.”

and “Shouldn’t Jody do it?”

and then “I think I saw Maxine around here somewhere. I’ll go get her.”

He tried not to be offended about it. Some people just weren’t good with kids. It was fine. Except didn’t Five love to play kickball with the Abel kids? And he remembered distinctly that night Five fell asleep with Molly splayed out on top of her.

So, was it something about _his_ kid she didn’t like?

He tried to spend time with her outside of the baby, too. Kytan and Cameo and Jody often ate together, so Sam made sure Five joined them, leaving a spot for her by his side. 

Today was an especially good day: they were having chicken curry for lunch, and Five actually smiled when he waved her over. She slipped in between Jody and Owen, who were deep in an argument.

“You can’t just _play_ Mozart and make the baby smarter, Owen. That was just an old wives’ tale.”

“Nu-uh, I remember reading about it! The melody is complicated so it makes the brain develop faster!”

To the side, Sam explained, “Jody and Owen are discussing the best music to play for baby Sarah.”

“Yeah I could hear them before I even came in the door,” Five joked, settling in and rolling her shoulders with a stretch.

“Five, you agree with me, right? Classical music isn’t magical or something—it can’t give your baby super intelligence.”

“Why not just play every type of music for her? Test _every_ hypothesis,” Five joked as she massaged her shoulder.

“Oh, you _would_ say that,” Jody huffed. “Not all music is good music, Miss I-Listen-to-Smash-Mouth-While-I-Run.”

“Hey!” Five pointed her fork menacingly, “Shrek songs are sacred.”

Owen was back to his argument: “All I’m saying is that it wouldn’t hurt to make the baby listen to some Canon in D.”

“It would be cool if Sarah came out smarter than Maxine and I put together,” Sam mused, “Like, you guys remember that movie Baby Geniuses?”

Jody made a face. “Jesus Christ not that disgrace of a movie.”

Owen didn’t recognize it. “What movie is this?”

“Not one you should remember,” said Cameo.

“Weren’t there like, four of them?” Jody mused. “How the hell did they manage that?”

Their conversation went on through lunch. Eventually they made a list of movies and classic kids games Five _had_ to pick up for Sarah the next time she was near a toystore. The conversation was easy; Five even smiled at a few of Sam’s dumb jokes. It was always fun to reminisce, and the divide between British and American toys was always hilarious. 

The conversation got louder, other people joined in, shouting out suggestions. Eventually, Maeve and Luke joined in, the old couple who worked with the lifestock and doted over baby Sarah like grandparents.

“You’ve got to start her off early with numbers,” Maeve insisted. “You’ve got to get her some of those numbers books.”

“I bet Five could find some of those. Right, Five?” He turned to her, and found she wasn’t paying attention. Her eyes were stuck on a point above her and to the right. Her irises flickered a little.

“Five?”

When he touched her, she jerked. “Um, yeah,” she said. “I could do that.”

“Or what about those books where you can touch different textures… like one has a rabbit fur? The next has snake skin… Do you know what I’m talking about, Five?”

Five was still stiff, and her eyes were twitching hard now. She wasn’t responding. Sam tried not to panic.

“…Five?”

Five’s face was hard, like she was arguing with someone but couldn’t force out the words. 

“You can’t—I’m not going to—” Abruptly, she stood up, making the table shake. “I need to go,” she said in a strangled voice. She didn’t even take her plate.

The table was quiet. Maeve made a tsking noise, shaking her head sadly. They all knew what this was. You couldn’t live in this world without some leftover trauma. This was the first time Sam had seen it in Five, though.

“Was it just me or… were Five’s eyes kind of…funky?”

Jody picked at her chicken. “Yeah, I’ve seen her eyes get like that before. She always acts weird after it happens.”

“My sister used to have absence seizures,” Cameo volunteered, “looked exactly like that. Her eyes would get all twitchy, wouldn’t remember what was going on.”

Sam didn’t like that idea. He thought about what Maxine had said, how some of Moonchild’s treatments permanently damaged the brain.

The rest of the table seemed comfortable to leave her alone. “Five doesn’t like attention,” Jody explained. “She doesn’t want the runners to see her that way.”

He wasn’t comfortable with that at all, and the longer he stared at the door, the more it bothered him.

“I’ll go—I’ll go see if she’s okay.”

He was at the door in seconds, anxiety overriding politeness. He looked around the nearby buildings; he didn’t think she’d gone far. The swap shop was to his right, full of people. He moved left, along a loading dock. There, he found her slipped behind a shipment crate. Her knees were tucked into her chest. Her head was hidden, but he could hear her panting. It was always so loud when she got upset.

“Hey, Five. It’s Sam. You—uh, you doing okay?”

Well that was a dumb question and he knew it, but he didn’t know if Five wanted him here, if she even wanted to talk in the first place.

“They’re still inside, chatting away, so you don’t have to worry about them.”

Another silence. He had a feeling the last thing Five wanted right now was attention from other Abel people, so he joined her at the wall, his knees pulled up to his rear.

“Was it something I said? Sounded a little too zombie-like?” he tried to joke. “I know that’s happened to me once or twice. One time Paula came up behind me and coughed a little _too_ growly and I nearly knocked her out with a well-placed teacup.”

Still, no response. 

“You know, it’s no big deal to get a little antsy sometimes. Maxie told me a little about PTSD and how we probably all have it. The craziest things start it off, like—"

“Patchouli,” Five wheezed through a closed-off throat. “That’s what she smelled like.”

“Who?”

“Maeve… and Moonchild.She loved patchouli. Had incense everywhere. Incense and weed and shrooms. Couldn’t _breathe_ sometimes, it was fuckin’—”

Five snarled. It was the most emotion he had ever seen her display, and it was gone in a flash. She shoved off the wall behind her and took a gasping breath. Now she was standing up, her hands in fists, looking down at Sam with an unreadable expression.

“I’m going to the track,” she said.

He watched her go, the midday sun shining bright off her hair. Then it was just him, sitting there like a knob, feeling like he had failed her somehow.


	6. Chapter 6

Sam ran into Five the next day, in Janine’s office. They were standing around a table of blueprints, talking quietly. It looked serious, like mission planning. Clearly, he missed a memo. He tried to act cool, like he came in here for the meeting, and not because he had come to ask Janine if they could do a Transformers movie night.

“What’s going on? And why is Amelia here?”

Amelia picked at her nails. “It’s always a joy to see you too, Sam.”

Janine looked up at him. “Ms. Spens has some new information. Something that could help us in case the Ministry turns.”

Amelia pointed to the main layout, in the shape of a rectangular building. “A Ministry stronghold. It’s not active, but my sources say it holds profiles. Background information on Steven Sissay and—more importantly—Sigrid.”

He eased into the chair next to them. “Oh, that’s not bad. So… do a little sneak-in and look-around action?”

Janine frowned. “It’s not exactly low security. If information got out that we were snooping around…”

“We’d be on even worse terms with Sigrid,” Sam finished for her.

Amelia, like always, was exasperated. “You guys are much too cautious. Having blackmail information on Sigrid—”

“ _Not_ blackmail, Ms. Spens. Just strategic intel.”

“Oh, like there’s a difference.”

“So this new information would help us prepare in case Sigrid tries any funny business against Abel?”

Janine nodded. “In these times, any knowledge is power.”

“Ooh, how eerie.” Amelia rolled her eyes. They looked winged today, which always shook Sam to his core. Who had time to do _winged eyeliner?_

“Now wait, is there any reason we _don’t_ want to do this?” He knew he was a mother hen to his runners, but he didn’t like that he’d missed some of the meeting. “Like, why haven’t we gone before now, if we knew the building existed?”

“Because we didn’t have the codes then,” said Amelia. “And your runners would’ve been blown to smithereens breaking in.”

Sam blinked, “Sorry— _blown_?”

“It’s a military stronghold; it’s got a couple safety measures built in,” she said off-handedly. “Now that we have the codes, I’m not worried about it. Besides, Five is up for anything, aren’t you Five?”

Five didn’t respond. A moment ago she had been standing all soldier-ly between the two women, but now her face had turned up a little. Her eyes were doing that same creepy thing as before.

Sam cleared his throat. “Five.”

She snapped back into awareness. “Sorry?”

By now, Janine and Amelia weren’t hiding their suspicious looks.

“Are you okay with this mission?”

“I…” she looked down at the plans like she had never seen them before, “Sorry, what?”

_Oh, jeez._

Janine certainly wasn’t going to let it go. “Runner Five, are you—”

“Sorry, Janine. Not enough sleep last night. I’m fine, just… dealing with a few nightmares.”

He had _never_ heard Five talk like that, admit to her problems so honestly. She said it so plainly, Sam knew it had to be a lie.

Amelia couldn’t be bothered. “Right, well, we’ll have the run on Tuesday, when I know Sigrid will be far away.”

“I enter through the south, with three separate codes,” Five confirmed.

“Yes, but… maybe you should be with someone.”

Five looked nonplussed. “I thought you said this was a stealth run.”

“Oh, it is,” Amelia confirmed, “But even _I’d_ rather have someone along in case you ‘wig out’ again.”

Sam could see Five stiffen. “I don’t wig out on runs,” she said lowly.

He hated to agree with anything Amelia said, but this time: “It wouldn’t hurt right? Just sending Jody along with you? She could be stealthy.”

Her dark eyes flickered to him.

“Please, Five,” he said softly, “It would make me feel a whole lot better.”

Something in her eyes softened. She took a breath. “Okay. Sure.” She moved back to the plans. “So target is 20 minutes east. We leave at sunset. We spend 30 minutes max in the building?”

Amelia nodded, “Any longer and the building will require further identification.”

Janine made a few specifications. They went over the codes again. Then it was over. 

He caught up with Five before she left though, something snagging in his mind.

“Hey…you’ll be safe right?”

He didn’t know what he was saying. Five was always fine after missions; she was called Five Still Alive for a reason. But he kept thinking about her eyes, unfocused and flickering like unstable flames. Owen said it had been getting worse.

“I’ll be back in time for Demons and Darkness,” she smiled. “In fact, I’ll have time to spare. Want me to pick anything up on the way back?”

* * *

“Okay guys, you’ll be nearing the stairwell in a moment,” Sam said, looking through both Five and Jody’s cams as they moved through the Ministry office.

It was just the kind of building you imagined would hold military info, all concrete coffin-looking, with four levels and rows of small square windows on one side. The inside was just as boring. Besides the high-tech security codes, it looked like a dreary nine-to-five office. Just rows upon rows of cabinet files, lit up in bad fluorescents. 

“This place is so barren,” Jody said. “I don’t think anyone’s been here in months. Possibly even before the outbreak started.”

“That’s good,” Janine reminded them. “Means we’re less likely to get caught.”

“It’s so boring, though. Maybe all the exciting stuff is on the upper levels. Like, maybe there’ll be a weapons cache hidden somewhere,” Sam mused hopefully.

“Mr. Yao, life is not a Call of Duty game. Random supplies won’t be just _lying_ around.”

 _Not even a sportsbra?_ said Five in Morse.

Sam laughed.

“What’s so funny, Mr. Yao?”

“Nothing, nothing. Now, Amelia’s info says their files are going to be on different floors. We don’t have a whole bunch of time, so it’s best if you split up. Jody, you have Steve on the first floor. Five, you have Sigrid on the second—or the third I guess, for those of you across the pond who don’t know how to count,” he teased.

 _Ha ha._ Five said, and he could hear the sarcasm drip off every letter.

He smiled, but Janine was giving him a Look, so he went back to his papers. “Now, each level has its own access code. Jody, yours is 30299. Five, yours is 05935.” He watched them as they keyed it in, and both lights blinked green. He felt himself settle a little bit more. Not to jinx anything, but this mission was surprisingly quiet.

He was watching two cams now, as they split up. Both floors looked similar, file cabinets on each side. The issue was, the cabinets were organized in some unknown pattern. They’d have to go through each one manually until they saw the correct names and ID number. He wasn’t too worried. His runners were always efficient. He let them on their own for a while, watching from their headcams as they flipped through the papers.

When he leaned back to stretch and take a sip of tea, he found Amelia was looking at him. He couldn’t read her expression, but he kind of felt like a bug under a magnifying glass.

“What?” he asked.

“Oh, nothing. It’s just interesting, how you tend to look through one cam more than all the others.”

“What? Whose?”

She inclined her head towards Five’s. 

“What? No, I don’t! Besides, she’s looking for Sigrid’s files. Isn’t that a little more important than Steve’s?”

Amelia shrugged noncommittally, but her expression was still annoyingly smug.

“Where did you get this information, anyway, Amelia? You’re always coming to us with secret info. I don’t know when we started trusting where you got it.”

“That’s because my network is so complicated. You wouldn’t even begin to understand.”

“So, like a long game of telephone, then? Just a bunch of hear-say? Sounds pretty sketchy to me.”

“Well, it’s working, isn’t it?”

From his right, Janine spoke up. “Ms. Spens, I’ve been looking over the blueprints. I think Runner Five might need to go further in. The files she’s looking at right now are all tactical personnel.”

Sam looked back at the cams. “Deeper? But there’s not…” Five’s headcam scanned the area. At the far end of the wall was another door, with another numbered lock. She moved toward it.

“Do we have a code for this?” Sam asked Amelia.

“Hmmm, possibly.” She flipped through some more of her notes. “Try… 31492.”

Five did. The door beeped red.

“Oh, hm, no. Okay try… 00219.” 

“Are you just guessing?” Sam asked.

The door beeped red again.

“Maybe try…”

“Amelia,” Sam said, feeling more tense by the second, “I don’t think we should be just throwing numbers around.”

“What, you think I’m just making these up?”

“He’s right, Ms. Spens. A third wrong try might send a signal to the Ministry.”

“Obviously I’m aware of that, but I think… Yes, 00215. I know it for sure.”

Five typed it in. Green, and the door was open.

Sam breathed a sigh of relief. Five stepped in and started looking around. Amelia couldn’t help but boast. “See, I know what I’m doing here with my—”

Suddenly, the room was lit with purple. An alarm started blaring.

“What? What was that?” Jody cried from the second level.

Even Sam was confused. “Is that an alarm? But the doors already opened!”

Amelia frowned. “Are those lights flashing purple?”

“Yes? What does that mean?”

Sam had never seen Amelia’s face so pale. “It means they need to get out of there, _now_.”

Sam scrambled to his mic. “Guys? That alarm isn’t friendly. Go back the way you came and get out.”

Jody was already near the door. “What happened? Didja get the code wrong?”

“We don’t know, but something must have alerted—Five, where are you going.”

Her cams showed her moving into the room, not away from it. She started on a file cabinet, flashing in the purple light. It was hard to hear her Morse above the buzzing alarm.

_I got this._

“Five, you absolutely don’t! You only have— how much time does she even have, Amelia?”

“I don’t know! I never got the full logistics of the building!”

“Don’t they usually announce the countdown?” Jody cried.

 _I’ll make it_ , Five tapped out.

“Five you don’t bloody have time!”

Jody was already outside, typing desperately to see if she could override the alarm. Amelia was shouting numbers at her. Janine was screaming at Five to get out.

In Five’s cams he could see the files, see her hands flying over the pages. She was at F, then G, then finally _H._ Hakkinen! Where was Hakkinen! It wasn’t there! Why wasn’t it bloody there?!

A rumbling erupted from the base of the building. He barely had time to take a breath. “FIVE, GET—”

Her cams went white.

In his other ear, Jody screamed. “Oh my god, the building is blowing itself up!” Jody’s cams shook from the explosion. The top floor of the building was in flames. With another rumble, explosions shook through the following floor, working its way down.

Sam felt like screaming. “Five is in there! Five is still in there! Jody, you need to—” But what could she do? What could any of them do?? Five could’t have made it down the stairs and the doors were all shut down now and if she waited if any room long enough she was going to–

Jody’s headcam swiveled. In the upper left corner, a figure smashed through a window billowing with flames. It fell through the air, flames licking behind it. It hit the ground hard.

“Is that—”

“Oh my God.”

Jody threw herself towards the body. It was Five, on the ground, unmoving, her eyes closed. 

“Is she alive? Is she breathing?”

“For the love of God, her shirt’s still on fire! Put it out!”

Jody’s hands were shaking. “She’s got a pulse but she’s not breathing right. Five? Five!”

In Jody’s cams, he got flashes of her body. Down her arm and leg were massive black and red burns, fresh and new. Her t-shirt sleeve was burnt completely off. The arm she landed on was bent—he almost thought he saw where the bone bulged out.

Her mouth was open but he couldn’t hear her breathing. That was the worst part of all.

Amelia ran from the comms shack. “I’m getting Maxine.”

Janine’s tone was tense. “Those are severe third degree burns.”

Sam heard his voice from outside his head. “Five! Five, please wake up!”

Janine left and then came back, grabbing the mic and talking over him, her voice gone full commander. “Ms. Marsh I’ve sent Runner 14 out on a bike. When he arrives, you need to help him arrange Runner Five on the bike and get her here as fast as possible, do you understand?”

Over it all, Sam kept calling Five’s name. He looked to her fingers, searching for a sign. But she wasn’t moving. She wasn’t breathing. All of a sudden, he realized he couldn’t either.

There was a skip of time, where everything moved so slow but also so fast. He was guiding 14 to the building, calling for Five’s name. Then he was sprinting from the building, at a dead-man’s run to the hospital. Suddenly he was in the medical room, and Five was on a gurney, her head strapped down, and Maxine was here, and Paula and Kelfilwe and that’s when he _knew_ it was bad, because they never put all three doctors in one place. Paula was grabbing tweezers and someone was stripping Five of her clothes and Sam felt like throwing up because _oh GOD_ a chunk of her skin peeled off with the shirt. Amelia was there, holding Five down as Maxine started an IV and people were shouting and someone was telling him to leave but his mouth caught up to his mind and he shouted “Wait! She doesn’t like morphine!”

Maxine looked at him like he was insane. “What do you _mean_ she ‘doesn’t like morphine’? Whendid she tell you this?!”

He found he couldn’t catch his breath. “A couple months ago! When she was—when Van Ark—”

Five moaned beneath them.

“Well, she certainly can’t hate it more than waking up with half her arm charred off,” Amelia scowled.

“Sam, this is very important. What medications did she mention and why? Does she have an allergy?”

“I don’t know! I don’t think so! I think she said morphine! Morphine and—and diladud or something.”

“Dilaudid. I know of it. Not very similar to morphine. I’ll have to find an alternative for them both.”

“Maxine, I just don’t know if she—”

Janine had had enough. “Mr. Yao I am not refusing analgesics to a runner when she so desperately needs it.”

And she was right and Five was stirring and writhing on the table and it looked so painful. So red and raw and scary, like her flesh wasn’t even human, but he had promised—

Maxine had already moved on from him, pulling out a needle. “I’ll use hydrocodone. It’s really all we have.”

A hand was on his arm, saying “Mr. Yao, if we aren’t helping we can’t be in here. The fewer bodies the better” but he could see Five twitching, her eyes rolling beneath her eyelids. She cried out, her voice split by her broken vocal cords, and she said his name. He couldn’t leave her—she was hurting and she couldn’t—not again—she needed to be okay, he—

He was too loud, and he knew it, but he needed to let them know, he needed to say—

“Sam! She’ll be asleep in thirty seconds. We need you _out_.”

And suddenly he was in the hallway, Janine and Amelia behind him. The door slammed shut. And there was silence.

Janine turned to Amelia. “Ms. Spens, we need to discuss our next steps. How do we cover up our tracks?”

“ _And_ I need to contact my sources. Something was wrong with those codes. That shouldn’t have happened.”

Then Janine was looking at him. “Mr. Yao, I need you to take a break. That kind of reaction isn’t useful in the field. You’ve clearly been overworking yourself.”

Both sets of eyes were on him, and he felt strangely ashamed. “Yeah… Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, I… I’ll go get some rest.”

Janine wasn’t cruel, “She’ll be okay, Sam. The doctors have it under control.”

He nodded, moved away. It wasn’t until he reached his bunk that he wiped his face, found his hands wet with tears. He hadn’t realized he’d been crying.


	7. Chapter 7

Five had a severe concussion, a broken arm, two cracked ribs, and third degree burns along her right side.

“And you said she jumped out of a third story burning building?’’ Maxine had said, “Honestly, she got lucky.”

Sam wasn’t so sure. When he was finally allowed to see her, she looked partial mummy and smelled like burnt flesh. Just seeing her made him feel miserable. She stayed mostly unconscious, only shifting enough to make his heart leap into his throat, before her voice would crack and she would settle. Maxine ushered him away after about three hours of biting his nails and sitting at her bedside. 

“I know there are no runs today,” she said, “But you aren’t helping yourself sitting here. Go help with harvesting apples in the greenhouse or play with Sarah or something. Five isn’t going to wake up for at least another day.”

So he did. He took Sarah and had one big long bonding session. She was at the age where playing finally started to get interesting, where she could worm her way around the room, babbling like a madman. She had bright big eyes and a habit for poking at his.

He was happy here, distracted enough that he even let himself lay down for a nap, with Sarah gnawing at the top of a marmite jar (he was so proud).

He wasn’t at all prepared for the town-wide PA system to blare on. “Abel township, this is Janine DeLuca, ordering a full lockdown of all gates. Runner 5 has disappeared, I repeat, Runner 5 has gone missing.”

He was halfway to the hospital before he realized he should probably not be running with a baby. He found Paula in short order, doing inventory, and nearly threw the baby like an American football. Paula was clearly just as surprised as he was at the announcement. “Five shouldn’t be up yet!” she warned.

“I know!” he cried, and booked it to the medbay like there were zombies on his tail. When he screeched into the room, he saw the bed was empty, but no signs of a struggle. Janine was speaking with another woman. Michaela—he thought—she must’ve been standing guard when it happened. Both Owen and Jody were there, too.

“What the hell do you mean she’s gone missing?” Sam interrupted.

Michaela looked mortified. “I just went to use the bathroom! That’s all, I swear! It couldn’t have been more than two minutes!”

“We’re worried someone must’ve taken her,” Janine said seriously.

Jody fretted. “There’s no way she should be up in her condition. Maybe she saw something she wasn’t supposed to see.”

Janine had gone full commander. “If it’s the ministry, we will know soon enough. Owen, round up all the Ministry agents currently residing in Abel. If I remember correctly, there should only be three. Jody, gather all runners and comb the township, starting from the gate. Sam, get back to the commshack and check the surrounding area. Make sure they didn’t already escape.”

They split up, but something was itching at the back of his mind as he and Janine ran past the helipad, then the open field. There wasn’t enough time for Five to see anything. If she did, why would the ministry take her, instead of just kill her? And where could someone possibly take a sleeping body in the span of two minutes? Something didn’t feel right, but he couldn’t figure out what. That is, until he ran past the gardens, lush with trees and, in the center, Runner 8’s statue. He looked at it for a second. Blinked, and looked some more.

“Janine,” he called, and he slowed his pace. “I think I found her.”

Janine stopped, followed his eyesight, and blinked. She opened her mouth, then closed it. There was a shadow hidden at Runner 8’s feet. “Is that…Did she _run…_?”

A sort of sadness came over him, as he began to put the pieces together. “You can call off the alarm,” he said quietly. “Maybe go get Maxine or Paula? I’m… I’m gonna go get her.” 

* * *

He saw she was shaking before he even reached her. She was curled up under Sarah’s feet, cradling her ruined arm against her stomach.

“Hey, Five.” He kept his voice quiet. The worst thing he could do is scare her off again.

She swung her head toward him, and her eyes were wide with fear, her pupils blown despite the sunlight.

“Sam? Sam where’s the baby? Where’s Sarah?”

“Sarah? She’s with Paula. Why?”

“Is she safe? Did I take her?”

“You… what? No, you didn’t take her. I just had her. Passed her off to Paula just a minute ago.”

She shook badly and wasn’t tracking well. Her eyes kept flicking upwards, to slightly above his left shoulder. The realization dawned on him like a sun.

“You hear her, don’t you?”

“Yes,” she whispered, honestly, brokenly.

“Five, it’s okay. It’s not abnormal. We’ve been hearing about it from other townships—they’re calling it Moonchild Syndrome. You’re not alone.”

Her voice was softened when she talked, but it slurred badly. “I woke up and I couldn’t focus, couldn’t think right. I was too happy, too comfortable. I thought I was back with her.”

“So, you ran,” he finished. She lagged, then nodded slowly, like the movement hurt.

He tried to kneel at her side, broadcasting his movements toward her. 

“Five, you’ve been badly injured. I don’t know what you remember, but you were in a burning building in your last run. You shouldn’t be moving ar—”

“Ach, shut UP!”

He startled, but she looked away from him and raked her fingers through her hair.

“I’m sorry—not you. She’s—she’s so loud right now.” Her head twitched twice, like she was trying to shake the voice out of her. 

“I can control her when I run. I can tamp her down. But, like this? I feel like I’m strapped down. Like you opened the door and let her in.”

“Oh, Jesus.” He didn’t know what to say. He wanted to apologize but no words were enough.

Five blinked, like a record player skipping. “Sam, where’s the baby? Did I take the baby?” She was looking at him the same way she did thirty seconds ago, shaking with fear, like they had just met up.

The concussion, he realized. The morphine and the concussion and Moonchild, it was breaking her apart. 

“The baby’s fine, Five. I’m sorry I let you have morphine. I just didn’t want you to be in pain.”

She looked away from him. In pain and heavy with drugs, she looked like a ghost, like a phantom of herself. Suddenly she was whispering, like she was reminding herself of something. “He died like this. Trying to get another hit. Like he deserved the relief. Like the world was so heavy otherwise. Went out of his mind before he finally OD’d. …Sometimes, I feel like that’s happening to me.”

“Who died, Five?”

She turned to him, and blinked like she had never seen him before. “Sam?”

This was going nowhere, he realized, and she needed to be back in bed. In his peripheral, he saw Maxine arrive. Janine said something to her, and they both turned to the statue. He couldn’t see her expression.

“Hey, Five, Maxine’s here. We’re gonna bring you back to bed, now, yeah?”

Five tensed as Maxine approached, but her eyes stayed trained on her bare feet in front of her.

Maxine had her Nice Doctor voice on as she came around to face them. “Hey, Five. Ready to go back?”

She looked up at the doctor, looking all but five years old. “Maxine? I—I’m sorry.”

Maxine didn’t even bat an eye, “That’s okay, Five. You’re just a little confused. But you shouldn’t be out here, you got hurt pretty bad. Will you let us walk you home?”

Finally, she nodded, and with much effort, they raised her up. Because of the false alarm, all of Abel was on pause for the time being. People were reluctant to go back to their jobs, still feeling a little unsafe. So they did that thing people do next to car crashes, or when someone goes crazy on the tube: they pretend they’re uninterested, but they’re all secretly fascinated, looking out the side of their eyes in morbid curiousity. Sam could feel all the eyes on him and Five, as they limped back to the medbay. He hated it, knew that Five would’ve hated the attention too, if she was any more with it. 

She was muttering to herself every so often, her eyes downcast. “Moonchild made everyone so happy. Made it all seem so nice.” Her head twitched again, like a tic. “It’s not real… It’s not—But when you get a hit, it doesn’t matter if its real. You lose control, you think it’s nice to not be in control. But then you wake up from it all comes back worse.” 

“It’s okay,” he kept repeating, “No one blames you for what Moonchild made you did.” By the time they reached her bed, though, the comfort sounded less and less real. “You’re going to be okay.”

Her eyes were wet when they finally laid her down. He didn’t think it was from pain. “I killed people, Sam. I killed them just to keep feeling good.” 

Her hand reached toward her neck, fluttered at the scars he knew were there. “No one should ever feel good like that.”

“No one.”

* * *

Janine put a heavy watch on Five after her Houdini incident. A guard was set around the clock. That was fine, Five allowed. Just as long as no one gave her any more pain relief.

Sam hated it, to be very honest. She was stuck to look like a Simon-counterpart: all scarring skin and raw legs. She hobbled around with a grimace on her face, toying with Jody’s knitting needles because she wasn’t allowed to read. When she groaned, he’d flinch because it sounded scarily close to a zombie. It was like some kind of self-inflicted torture.

Luckily, Maxine said she was healing surprisingly fast. Within three days, she was let to walk around the track (“but absolutely _positively_ no running, Runner Five. _Or I will skin you myself.”)_

He found her beside the track that night, after sunset, sitting up on the knoll that overlooked Abel, legs splayed in the grass. Chicken Nugget was by her side, having a ball with a leftover pork bone. She smiled when she saw Sam, and suddenly he forgot what he was originally going to say.

He managed “Uh, come here often?”

She laughed. “Yeah, since I’m not allowed out of Abel yet.”

He settled next to her on the grass, turned to look out over the miscellaneous collection of buildings that made up Abel. The town was settling for the night, cleaning up dinner and settling into bed. Someone had recently rigged up a pretty good lighting system a few weeks ago, made it look like a proper town. It also made it look kind of sparkly, the strings of bulbs that were wired along the buildings and across the streets. They were quiet for a while; she made the silence comfortable.

“I’m sorry I let Maxie give you those painkillers,” he finally said. “I didn’t know it’d make Moonchild so loud.”

“It’s okay, Sam. I can’t blame you for being scared.”

They both stared upwards, watching the stars fade in. The air smelled cool and fresh. From here Abel’s walls seemed distant. The earth protected them instead.

“But there’s something I need to ask. You had warned me about not giving you pain killers even before we knew about Moonchild. How did you know?”

Five shook her head. She folded her legs in, pressed her hands into the grass beneath her. Chicken Nugget sniffed at her a little, then went back to chewing on his bone.

“I grew up in a really small mining town. The kind that was destined to be a ghost town, if people weren’t so stubborn.

“My boyfriend,” she cleared her throat, “My boyfriend got in a car accident when we were in high school. Got his back all messed up. The doctor prescribed him some heavy meds, and he was supposed to go off of them within two months, but there were complications… He just kept taking them and I thought—I didn’t know he was supposed to wane off. But the prescriptions had stopped, and he couldn’t handle it. He said his back ached all the time. He said he just needed to heal, just needed a few more months. He couldn’t get a job. Couldn’t—couldn’t move on.”

“He got addicted to the heavy stuff. The stuff that you hear about in news stories. Codeine and fentanyl, then heroine. He OD’d the day I turned twenty-two.”

“I swore I’d never get near the stuff, after seeing that. I never understood it. Why he couldn’t restrain himself. Why couldn’t he just control himself. Just two weeks. Two weeks of being clean. He didn’t even _need_ to work a job—I took care of him! …”

She let a breath out, and it whistled in her throat.

“But then I felt Moonchild, and I understood. The relief, it’s just so addictive. Everything, _everything_ is going wrong and you just want to escape for one second… It’s enough to make you do anything.”

The wind picked up, carried some leaves across the knoll. Her head was held high, her jaw was flexed. In the silence, something connected.

“Five, did he hit you?”

She sighed, rolled out her shoulders, and went to massage her neck. “You get mood swings from withdrawal. Sometimes he’d lose his mind. Sometimes I felt like giving him a hit just to get him off my back.”

“One time, when he saw I took some money to pay for groceries, he got really mad. Threw me around a little. Lifted me up by the neck, yelled like I could hear him over my gasping for breath.”

“That’s why my throat’s all fucked up. Why I can’t breathe right. Makes me mad sometimes. I liked singing.”

She reached for Nugget’s fur, buried her hand behind his ears. “It’s funny, sometimes. Thinking about my past self. Current me fights zombies on a daily basis. Past me couldn’t even stand up and tell him no.”

Sam’s mouth felt dry. His heart ached at the way her voice softened.

“Five, you don’t…”

“Sam, I was so scared when you were bit after Sarah was born,” her voice ached in honesty. “When Jody and I had to go get you I—I couldn’t—I didn’t think I could come back to Abel after it.”

“I keep thinking about that day—that clone of me stealing off with her and… I’m not safe, Sam. With Moonchild in my mind, I’m never really safe.”

“You think Moonchild might make you hurt Sarah,” he realized.

“I know she could take control whenever she wants. And it’s—me being here, it’s not worth it.”

He blinked, turned to look at her. Her head had turned to the right, gazing off into the distance. She was looking at the gate. He didn’t like that look in her eyes.

“Five, we aren’t kicking you out of Abel,” he said, feeling almost affronted by the idea.

“No, but I could do it myself.” Her voice had gone all dreamy. He wasn’t going to let that slide. Something washed over him—an anger, maybe. He thought about Five and her humor and her laugh and everything that had happened to her—her boyfriend and Moonchild and all that she had been through and the ache in his chest hardened, pride and anger and the urge to protect.

“Five, you’re… you’re not weak because of Moonchild. You’re not weak because of what _he_ did to you and you’re not weak because Moonchild messed with your mind. You know, I could see you through the tones, when you broke in that night. You were fighting her so hard. You’re… well you’re Runner Five! You’re strong as hell! Whatever is going on with Moonchild we will work with it. I’m not going to ‘save’ Abel just to lose the people I lo—care about.”

They were facing each other now, a lot closer than he remembered. Her eyes were searching him, and he caught himself thinking about how soft her hair looked when it was let down like that.

Between them, Chicken Nugget sneezed.

The trance was broken, and Chicken Nugget trotted off to sniff out a foreign smell.

Five stood to go after him, being careful with her arm, and Sam took a moment to collect himself.

“I’m sorry I keep avoiding Sarah,” Five called behind her. “You know I’m really happy she’s here, right? I just…”

“I know,” he said honestly, and followed her slowly down the hill. “Hey, but as soon as we get this Moonchild business under control? Let’s teach her our version of Morse.”

“Sam, she’s an _infant_.”

“I know! But as soon as she’s old enough! Imagine how mad that would make Maxine and Paula!” 

Five laughed. It was raspy and two-toned, but beautiful just the same.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at runnerable.tumblr.com!


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